Yes, indeedy. Yesterday my finger almost fell off. I gained a few followers and may have sold three or four books but I’m thinking tweetying is not my natural state. I feel like I’ve been scattering breadcrumbs for the pigeons and gained a few pigeons when all I really wanted was to sit down on the park bench, admire the clouds, and eat my lunch. Another ounce of promo and my refried brain will sizzle out my earholes.

This post was to be used for promo but my co-writer Leia Shaw (write that down so you know who else to avoid) yes, Leia, told me I’d had way too much coffee. It’s hard to look sideways at someone in an email, but she managed.

Ready? Steady? Fall over.

One of the first things we learn as a writer is to Write What You Know. This is an unwritten law of writing that’s been handed down from above eons ago. Well, maybe it is written, like here, but unwritten sounds sooo much better.

So, ahem, what if we don’t know something that we need to write? If you are like me and write Scfi or fantasy or steampunk BDSM (which is retro-scifi, pseudo-Victorian fantasy with lots of fetish clothes and diabolical machinery for making the heroine feel really really glowy. This is a family post, see, so I didn’t say ‘for giving her mind-blowing orgasms’)

I digress. In brackets, but still, digressing was done.

Where was I? Research. Well, if you write fantasy, get kidnapped by an alien or something. Okay? Good. It worked for me last month. You know what they say about aliens and probes? Well, these guys, they really did have green skin.

If you write real sex with people who have all the normal human bits – I’m not talking tentacles, or double dicks or nano-enhanced sex here...if you write real, then your best alternative is to research. Maybe even do it? Maybe. I mean how hard can it be to try out some of the things you find on the net?

This is how I found out that erotic writers need the sexual equipment of a rhinoceros. We need to be tough, peoples. Man up. Or woman up…which does sound rather naughty, but it’s true.

So – suggested net activity – letting your partner apply a clamp to one’s clit then string the cord attached to a swivel thingy on the ceiling and thence to a spot on the floor…this is not for the cowardly. Don’t faint.

Did I research this one fully? Let us ask another question. Did the neighbor hear a scream in the middle of the night and then sirens? Do I have an appointment with a plastic surgeon? Am I suing Google?

The answer to those? I’ll let you guess. Research has limits for me. I have browsed many forums and threads and web pages looking for sexy shenanigans. Figging and nipple clamps and other fun stuff has swished, crawled and swung through my mind. Some of it I may have tested in the name of thoroughness. But not the first. I have come to the conclusion that sometimes being abducted and probed by aliens is far more sensible than some of the activities on the net.

Activities…on the net. Come to think of it, among those that should come with a warning is chat messaging. I have put on four kilos since I began this nefarious activity.

Chat messaging is goddamned fattening.

Yes. Where does it say that, I ask you? There MUST be calories in those letters. Four kilos! Which is why I have now started using smaller words. No longer do I call people rapscallious empty-minded lunatics. Now they are twits or idiots, or bitches if I’m in a bad mood. Ask Leia Shaw my co-author of 31 Flavors. She knows.

I’ll tell you in a month if this word diet is working.

What else has writing taught me? That using the keyboard too much makes your fingers go numb first, then your wrists, and then your arm. Getting struck by a poison dart shot by a pygmy in the jungle makes all of you go numb.

Therefore, using LOGIC, I’m sticking to using the keyboard; it’s safer than pigmy darts.

Coffee. Another activity encouraged by surfing the net. Yes, this is connected to my previous ramblings. Do not run away. Sit!

I have wondered about the mind-enhancing effects of this wonder drug, coffee. And so, I researched this too. I’ve found that drinking it seems the best way of getting it into your system. Inhaling, bathing in or injecting coffee just doesn’t do much for me.

Madness. Another crucial subject for the erotic romance writer. Am I gibbering? Can writing be bad for your sanity? This is such an important question. We need to understand that sitting by oneself in a room with only inanimate things for company and a litter of letters on the pc screen can be deleterious to your mental health. But not mine. Yours. I’m perfectly okay. Per-fect-lee SANE!

Go read a book now. You need to. Like maybe read 31 Flavors which I did not research at all. Since it’s a true story, we went by what Sidney told us, and only imagined a teensy bit. So I haven’t bought a spatula or a riding crop, nor did I ask my husband to spank me.

Truly. I wouldn’t lie to my dear readers. Have a nice day, and pardon me while I go play horsies.

Author

Cari Silverwood writes the way the world should be - dangerous and sexy with bullets piercing the darkness and lovers wrenched close by ropes. When you need escape, when you need that rough lover to bring you to your knees, here you will find stories to singe your fingers. The taste of adventure, the tang of BDSM, the burn of fantasy run wild. Brace yourselves, if you dare to read.